No. 4 Stores Depot RAAF

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Brief History

With the outbreak of War in 1939 the RAAF strength in Western Australia began to increase, accelerating with the Japanese threat to the north-west. To provide support for an operational build-up, two stores depots were to be formed in Western Australia, one of these being No. 4 Stores Depot which was to be the area specialist depot for non-technical equipment. On 19 Jan 1942 an advance party gathered at s military drill hall in Lord Street, East Perth. While proposed sites at both Narrogin and Merredin were inspected, the 4 Stores Depot nucleus remained in the Lord Street drill hall for sevcrul weeks until t!Victed at a moments notice, then moved into .1nothcr drill hall in Ea>t l'crth. The utut was aga.in evicted from thi~ hall ~hortly afterwards. but fortunately by thts Lime the new depot s•te had been organised. Eventually, the Depot was located in the McKay ass~y liarrls butldlng in Whatley Crescent, Maylands (an eastern Perth "uburb). This was taken over on 17 March 19·12, but there were tntha l problems as only about half (some 3000 square metres) of U1e total bluldmg ar<>n was available for the RAAF. lllC remainder w.ts used by the original building owners to store! their tractors. After ovcrcommg considerable initial ddficulty m adnptmg the butlding for administrative acrommodaUon, the Depot headquarters sta ff all moved to Maylands. Another part of the Depot, comprising workshops dnd rnessL'S, was later located m Ca ledonian Avenue, Mnylands. An advance p~rty of 2 1 members, w1t.h Flight L1cutenant I'. B. Jclbart as OHicer-m-Charge and Flying Officer M. Thon>son, were posted from 4 Stores Depot on I January 19~3 to form 10 Stores Depot at Men'edin. Like other stores depots during the war years, 4 Stores Depot initially occupied several remote Sitt-s around Perth, 'uch as the Kaut1 Tunber Company bu1ldmg at lOth Avenue, Mayland~ and one m Wright Street for clothmg. Ongomg alteration to the Massey Hams bwldmg eventually enabled some of these remote siti.'S to be acated, and stock brought into the Maylands building on 30 September 19-13. Some of the Depot's bulk storage was actually at 10 Store;, Depot at Metl'edm as 4 Stores Depot was short of storage space. The Kauri Tunber Company bu1ldmg was cleart'<l and handed over to 4 Central Recovery Depot (4CRD), which formed an advance party there on 13 April 1944 as Detachment 'C', 4 Central Recovery DepoL Other construction earned out at the Maylands s1te was a new administration block. completed on 8 December 1943. It was also planned to construct two BcUman hangars on s1te for 1ncreased storage; later this proposal was amended to two 'woolshed' type bu~dmgs. However, neither of these were ever bu1lt. 4 Stores Depot had no domcst1c accommodation on the Depot, with airmen generally lwing out-either Dl home for those coming from Perth or in private accommodation. However, becai.IM! the Depot strength never axceeded 24 1, Its peNIOnncl were able to be accommoda ted locally with a minimum of difficulty. Lntcr a large pnvate building. called the 'Gables', was taken over to accommodate the WAAAF. There was one "'c1dcnt involving fraud over the supply of clearung rags. Cleaning rags were all supplied from the eastern States, and payment was made bolscd on the weight delivered to the milway station. At the tin1e, the rtoceipt~ scclion blaff were having considerable difficulty in reconciling the weight of the bales receiVed w•th the we•ght recorded on acceptance at the eastern States railway statiOn. The bales received in Perth were always much hghtcr. First 1nves11gallons were based on the premise that cleamng rags were bcmg stolen en route. It was only when one of the bales caught fire from spontaneous combustion that an explanation was found. The supplier had worked out that it could increase the weight of each bale by wetting the rags before delivery to the railway station. The tra1n JOurney from Victona would normally take several weeks, and this would be suffiCient for the bali.'S to dry out. 95 96 4 Stores Depot wns handicapped regarding the service it could provide, as w,>stcm Australia did not have much local industry at the time. V~rtually all manufactured goods had to come from the eastern St .. tes, with the attendant transportation delays of that time. Ncar the end of the War, 4. Stores Depot formed the Ccntml Footwear RepalJ' Section to effect shoe and boot repau-s for all or the Perth units, including those as far away as Busselton and Gerald ton. During May, ten 7.6m ~ 7.6m huts were acquired and erected in the Depot domesllc area compound to ,,lleviate chronic storage problems. The first two huts were completed m June 1945. Immediately following the end of the War, it \Vas decided that most of 4 Stores Depot's stocks would be transfem.>d to Merredln. Remaining stock was transferred to 1•1 Stores Unit m Adelaide, and th1s was completed on 30 September 1945. 4 Start'S Depot was disbanded on 19 November 1945, becoming the first depot to disband at the end or the War.